Modify Group Policy Refresh Interval for Windows computers

In this post we will see how to modify Group Policy Refresh Interval for windows computers. Most of the system admins know that group policy is updated or refreshed in the background every 90 minutes. For most of us 90 minutes of time frame is fine. But if you want to change or modify this refresh interval time then you can do it via group policy. The policy setting to change the group policy refresh interval time is available for users and computers. You don’t have to configure both the user and computer value, you can modify just one of them.

I am talking about the policy setting “Set Group Policy refresh interval for computers“. This policy setting specifies how often Group Policy for computers is updated while the computer is in use (in the background). This setting specifies a background update rate only for Group Policies in the Computer Configuration folder. The Group Policy refresh interval for computers policy also lets you specify how much the actual update interval varies. To prevent clients with the same update interval from requesting updates simultaneously, the system varies the update interval for each client by a random number of minutes. The number you type in the random time box sets the upper limit for the range of variance. For example, if you type 30 minutes, the system selects a variance of 0 to 30 minutes. Typing a large number establishes a broad range and makes it less likely that client requests overlap. However, updates might be delayed significantly.

Modify Group Policy Refresh Interval for Windows computers

Using Group policy, let’s see how to change group policy interval for windows computers. I am logged in to a domain controller with an account that is a member of domain admins group. Edit a policy and in the group policy management editor, click on Computer Configuration > Policies > AdministrativeTemplates > System > GroupPolicy.

Right click on policy setting “Set Group Policy refresh interval for computers” and click Edit. The interval at which a group policy is refreshed is defined by a refresh interval value and an offset interval value. By default, if the administrator does not modify the default setting, group policy is updated in the background every 90 minutes, with a random offset of 0 to 30 minutes.

Note – The interval at which the background refresh of a group policy occurs for the computer and the user are maintained separately. The administrator has the option of modifying these default values or disabling the ability to refresh a group policy in the background.

As an example, i am just changing the below value from 90 minutes to 60 minutes. Click on OK.

To see if the group policy has been successfully applied or not, login to one of the computer. On the client computer, click on start and click run. Type rsop.msc and hit enter. This will open Resultant Set of Policy window. Click on Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > Group Policy. On the right pane you will see a policy setting. Double click on the policy setting and you should see your new group policy refresh interval for computers.

I am Prajwal Desai and I have been working in the IT for over 8 years with a strong focus on Microsoft Server Technologies. For the last five years, as a System Administrator I have been working on Lync, SCCM, Vmware, VDI, Exchange, Windows Servers etc. I’m currently very interested in everything related to Azure, Configuration Manager, Lync, Windows Server and Exchange.